The Dash!

The Dash!

An invitation was extended for me to join a family that morning on their journey to “Centro.”  Centro, as I learned, is a huge area (about the size of 4 football fields) in the middle of the jungle, which was burned and mostly cleared in order to provide garden areas for the people of the community to use for growing crops: bananas, pineapple, corn, manico, etc.

  Just as soon as you think you are in shape, take the hour and fifteen minute hike on the jungle trails to get to this place, and you’ll quickly think again.  (And the family I went with, did this hike barefoot!!!)


       The journeying process was interesting.  The father went ahead of us – the mother, 3 sons (ages 1, 2, and 5) and I – to a point where we could not see him.  This was for protection reasons.  The father and mother “cooed” (like owls) back and forth every few minutes.  The coo would come from the father and then the mother cooed in response, to let him know that she heard his coo and understood the direction of which he was in, so she knew which trails to take for us to “follow” him.



At one point, while the mother was cooing, breastfeeding the 1 year old, and talking to me (multi-tasking at its finest), the mother took off in a full out sprint!  Baby attached, off she went, with 2 kids and myself trying to keep up.
After our 100 yrd. dash, I just had to ask what in the world that was for (other than to further remind me of how out of shape I am compared to those here in the Amazon).  Her reply: “The castanha; they kill people.”  She then explained that the falling castanha (a huge nut with 10 – 15 smaller nuts inside) fall from such a height that when they fall on a person’s head, it kills them.  

     For this reason, when they get to “castanha row” they sprint through this area, in order to lessen their chances of getting hit by one of these life-stealing nuts.

     This journey gave me a good spiritual reminder… Am I as cautions with my spiritual path as I am with these kinds of trail paths in the jungle, always on the guard for spiritual dangers and seeking the Holy Spirit's guidance to avoid them?  

     It's easy to just live life and go on with our day without putting as much prayer and consideration of the Holy Spirit’s guidance into our steps as we should.  When we don't follow Him, it's easy to trip, fall, and/or get hit in the head by a big "nut," spiritually.

Galatians 5:25 says, “Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit” and Psalms 37:23-24 says, “If the Lord delights in a man’s way, he makes his steps firm; though he stumbles, he will not fall, for the Lord upholds him with His hand.”

Stand Out today by following His steps, 

which will lead you down God's perfect trail. 

Proverbs 16:3 “Commit to the Lord whatever you do and your plans will succeed.”

Cake!

Some Cake

Romans 8:28 “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to His purpose.”

As I was walking to a friend’s house for Bible study, I heard a familiar voice holler from across the field: “I want some cake!”  Having nothing but my Bible and a bowl of rice in my hands, I didn’t give any attention to the Chief's proclamation for cake.   I continued walking.  Again, I heard him yell two more times, “I want some cake!”  This time, I turned to see who he was yelling to, because honestly, by this point, I too wanted some cake; but there was no one but he and I walking along the paths of this field.

I stopped walking so he could catch up to me.  As he approached, he again said, “I want some cake.”  “Sir, I’m sorry, I only have a bowl of rice and a Bible, would you like some rice?” I offered.  Then I thought, “Lord, is this a water-to-wine moment?  Do you want me to do a miracle in Your Name and turn this bowl of rice in to a cake so our Chief’s cake-craving will subside?”  The Spirit didn’t move me to do such a thing.

“Oh, sorry my daughter,” he said. “I thought you had cake, and all morning I’ve been wanting cake.”

After Bible study, I came back to my room and remembered that I had a present, which a dear friend had given me.  I opened it and wouldn’t you believe it… it was a small cake! 

CAKE! Instantly I heard those words repeating over and over in my head: “I want some cake!”  I chuckled a bit, knew God was up to something, cut off a few pieces for our dear Chief, and headed to his house.  As I approached, cake behind my back, he had the most inviting smile on his face.  I presented to him the pieces of cake and he just about came off the front porch in excitement.  He then said, “I am so glad you came by, I have something I wanted to talk to you about.  Please sit next to me.”  Eager to hear how God was connecting all these cake-dots together, I sat down, ears wide opened.

For the next hour, the Chief of our community shared with me how he encountered God, in a whole new way.  The night before there was no sermon preached to him, no verses of scriptures read; not even a missionary or pastor present at the time, but in the privacy of his own home, he and his wife (who had already accepted Christ as her Savior, with me a few months prior) lifted up some miraculous prayers to God.     

For our Chief, it all finally clicked.  The “Light” came on.  God flooded this man’s head and heart with thoughts about his community and his life, which brought him to his knees in order to find his Savior. 

No doubt, pray warriors, your prayers made this happen.  Nothing else could explain the private encounter which our Chief had that night with the Lord.  Whoever you are, however you were praying, fasting, and petitioning our Precious Savior, on behalf of our Chief’s salvation, Thank You!  With tears of joy I exclaim to you, THANK YOU! Once again, your prayers made the difference.

Stand Out today and share your testimony 

and a piece of cake, for eternity sake.

The Voice

The Voice

As many of you know, I have a pet monkey.  For those of you who don’t know Nicco yet, let me give you a brief introduction of him now: 

Nicco is a 10 month old spider monkey that I bought for about $12.00 in a city nearby the community where I serve.  I got Nicco when he was only about 4 months old and he’s been a wonderful companion.  Nicco goes free in the community and comes in and goes out of my window as he pleases.  During the day, he swing in the trees, eats insects, and play with the kids.  At night, because he is afraid of the dark, he is in my room and in his little hammock, asleep by 7:00pm.

Nicco and I have a system.  Whenever I call Nicco’s name, he knows that means his “momma” has a banana for him, so he calls back to me - he lets out a couple of loud squeaks to let me know his whereabouts. We continue the “calling system” back and forth until I am close enough to his location for him to make a bee-line for my arm, to sit there and eat his banana.

This last week, something came over me and I had a terrible head and chest cold.  One day, after coming back from my normal morning house visits for devotions, I, like always, called for my little Nicco.  No response.  I called again and again.  Still, nothing.  A bit worried that someone might have decided Nicco would make a good, fried side-dish to their lunch, I asked a couple nearby children if they had seen Nicco.  They took me to the tree he was joyously swinging from branch to branch and eating insects. As soon as he saw me, he ran for my arm and ate his banana.

Then it hit me...  My voice doesn’t sound like my normal voice because of this illness.  Nicco didn’t know this voice that was calling for him, therefore, he didn’t answer it.  


The same is true with us and God.  Once part of the family of God through salvation, we become sons and daughters of God.

1 John 3:1a “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!”

In John 10:4b - 5, Jesus refers to His own as “sheep” and says, “His sheep follow Him because they know his voice.  But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.”  Nicco didn’t call back to me the other day because to him, my voice was that of a stranger.  

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we know our Father’s voice.  It’s not strange to us.  Any other voice you hear inside your head is that of a stranger – a deceiver – an evil one; RUN from this voice!  Don’t listen to the words of guilt and lies surrounding a situation you know you have already been forgiven from! Don’t believe the self-condemning words that are whispered in your ear!  You are a child of God, and he speaks good, encouraging, productive words for His loved ones to hear.  Don’t listen to the voice telling you to do something or say something you know does not line up with the Word of God.  Run, Run, RUN away from these strange voices and run in to the arms of your Father, the Good Shepherd, whose voice is distinguishably better than any other.

Stand Out today by tuning in to hear Jesus calling your name.

Go Fish

Go Fish

After getting in the canoe, I popped in my MP3 earphones and settled in for the 3 hr. ride ahead, to return to our Amazonian, jungle community.  I was seated in the front, my Brazilian, missionary partner was a couple seats back, and our driver was in the far back.   It had been a great day and while humming along to the praise and worship music, a discussion between God and I began, concerning how He speaks to His people.  

“God, how do You speak to us and how can we know Your voice?  God, Why don’t you talk to us like people talk to each other? We could understand you better if you did.”  These were my humanistic, simplistic, narrow-minded thoughts coming out in a prayer to God. 

“My child, I’ve given you the Holy Spirit inside of you to go with you and speak to you no matter where you are or what you’re doing.  Isn’t that so much better than how you humans speak to one another?” This was God’s reply.

“Yes, Lord.  You’re right.  That is better.”

“It is you who must listen differently, my dear.  Not I who must speak differently.”

While pondering this profound point, something slimy hit my foot and continued to go crazy on the floorboard of the canoe, right below me.  It was a fish!  A fish had jumped in to our canoe and landed right at my feet!  Laughing, I picked it up and turned around to show my partner and the driver.  After doing so, our driver gave me the thumbs up and held up another fish!  One that had apparently jumped in between him and my partner about 30 minutes before my incident.
These 2 fish, put with a little rice, would be just enough for my partner and I for dinner.

“See my child, I speak in ways much grander than the way of humans; but you must listen, not just with your human ears, but with your eyes and your heart as well.”

Isaiah 55:9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.”

I had prayed the Lord’s prayer earlier, which contains the phrase “Give us Lord our daily bread,” and He spoke in response to my prayer – He threw fish in our canoe.

We may not hear the voice of God in a burning bush (Moses), audibly (Samuel), in a gentle whisper in the wind (Elijah), or through an angel appearing to us in a dream (Mary), but we can, personally, hear the voice of God.  We can hear it if we tune our ears, eyes, heart, and mind, to listen differently than we normally would to a family member or friend.

As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are God’s ways and thoughts higher than ours.  If His ways and thoughts are higher, then why wouldn’t we think that His voice would be higher as well?  Everything of God’s is higher.  It is us that must adjust our listening, not God who must adjust His speaking.  Listen and watch for the voice of God.  It’s truly amazing the places you’ll find it if you are walking in step with Him.

STAND OUT today and tune in to the various, unique, ways that 
God may be speaking to you.

Turtle Brains and Daily Delicacies

Turtle Brains and Daily Delicacies

WARNING: If you have a tendency to get a weak stomach over “edible” items that are a little out of the ordinary, you might want to pass up reading the first part of this blog.  

At 11:00am, *Maria came to my door with a huge grin on her face.  Something was up.  “Will you come eat lunch with us?”  was her request; but her face said so much more.  

Hmm... I saw something unique cooking over a large fire earlier in the day. I enthusiastically accepted her offer and silently lifted up the famous missionary prayer: “Lord, I’ll get it down if You’ll keep it down.”

*Maria, Nicco (my pet monkey), and I entered the house and on the floor were seated 8 of *Maria’s family members.  (Note: In the Amazonian community where I live, we eat all of our meals seated on the floor.)  They praised me for joining them and then sat me at the place of honor.  UH, OHHH!!!  I was the GUEST OF HONOR at this meal!  Which means… the delicacies would be given to ME!!!

On my plate, they placed A GIANT TURTLE HEAD!  Then, nine pairs of eyes fell on me.  As I looked around the circle, I saw in their eyes the most generous, beautiful, sacrificial looks.  My heart melted.  Nine people in that room would have LOVED to have had what was on my plate.  Turtle head is a delicacy here in this part of the Amazon, and this family was honoring me by giving it to me.

With a curious, tilted-head look from Nicco and another (more desperate) silent prayer, I turned to *Maria and said, “*Maria, I’ve never had such an honor given to me before.  This is my first turtle head. Would you please show me where to begin?”  
-“With the eyes!” was her quick, smiling, turtle-head-eating-expert, reply. 

I clung to the first part of Ephesians 6:18 like never before: “Pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.”  Oh, believe me, all kinds of prayers and requests were going up, especially as she said next, “Now, break the scull like this and eat the brains.”  Eyes, brains, and then the tongue.  Where was this chapter in the “Jungle Survival Training Manual”?  Did I sleep through this class?

It was an unforgettable meal, for many reasons, but principally because of the looks in the eyes of those around me when that huge head was put on my plate.  This family didn’t have to invite me (the foreigner) to come to their special meal.  They could have shared that head among themselves. Yet, in order to thank me and honor me, they wanted to give me their very best – and they did that by giving me the one delicacy that they had.

They have so little here, yet, whenever they do have something special, they don’t horde it for themselves – rather, they seek to generously honor someone else with it.

How many delicacies do we, as Americans, receive on monthly, weekly, and even daily basis that we only use only for ourselves?  A delicacy can be anything from a small monetary gift, to a Krispy Kreme donut for breakfast, or a few unexpected hours off of work.   What do we do with delicacies that come our way?  

Philippians 2:3-4 reminds us to consider others better than ourselves and to not look to our own interests but to the interests of others.

STAND OUT today and honor someone else with something God has blessed you with!

*Names have been changed in order to honor security regulations.

13 Birthdays

13 Birthdays

At first, it looked like a birthday party like any other… there were people laughing, food and drinks were being passed around, the “Happy Birthday” song was sung, and little gifts and cards were being given to me, the “Birthday Girl.”  

And then… the room fell silent.

The majority of you know that I’m not one who is normally at a loss for words. Give me a crowd full of people and a microphone and you’ll see that you’ve put me right in the middle of my sweet spot.  Nothing energizes me more than being able to spiritually motivate people from a stage.  But we all have our insecurities.

Here in Brazil, my top two insecurities are making coffee (without a coffee maker) and speaking the Portuguese language – two major things that an Amazon missionary (or anyone living in Brazil for that matter) MUST do.  The coffee thing, I’m getting better at; but mastering this foreign language has been, by far, my greatest struggle.  I tell myself that these things keep me humble and dependant on God.  Little did I know, He would put my dependency on Him, to the ultimate test:

The room fell silent.  In the middle of all the festivities, it was though someone had turned a switch – and all eyes were on me.  It was time to make a speech – In Portuguese!  One-on-one, and in our community church services, I normally do just fine with my Portuguese, but in spontaneous public speaking moments, my insecurity monster tends to show his ugly head.

I took a deep breath, looked out at all the eyes of those who I have lived among for the last 11 months, and screamed a silent prayer for help.  A unique love and compassion then began to rush through me.  Then, Mark 16:17 came to life. (“They will speak in new tongues.”)  From my mouth came the most beautiful Portuguese I have ever heard.  I spoke with words and phrases that I could have never put together on my own.  From my mouth, the Holy Spirit spoke about how one can “be saved” (Romans 10:9) and what it means to have eternal life (John 3:16).  

After speaking for a few minutes, I paused, and realized that this was no ordinary birthday party.  God was in the mist of divinely orchestrating something far beyond what I could have asked or imagined (Ephesians 13:2).  From my mouth then came Matthew 10:32-33: “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven.  But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.”  With a boldness unlike ever before, I asked if there was anyone who wanted to put off their old way of living, publicly acknowledge their faith in Christ, and surrender their life to God in that moment.”  Twelve hands went up!  

I called on one of the spiritual leaders of the community, who is known for her faithful discipleship; and she led the twelve in a beautiful prayer, for salvation.

Applause filled the room after the prayer was finished.  A new reason for celebration was now on everyone’s lips.  We were now not only celebrating my physical birthday, but also the spiritual birthdays of 12 new members of the family of Christ.  THAT calls for celebration!  

John 3:3 – “In reply Jesus declared, ‘I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.’ ”

2 Corinthians 5:17 – “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”

John 1:12 – “Yet to all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God.”

Let's CELEBRATE!  There are now new children of God in this Amazonian community!  

Stand Out today and share your testimony with someone.  

It may lead them to celebrate their first birthday, spiritually.

It Can Be Fixed... Right?!?

It Can Be Fixed… Right?

Recently, I was extremely blessed to have a team of American’s come and join me for a short time here in the Amazonian community, where I live.  On their last day in the community, the Americans and some Bible students of mine built a large cross together.  The heat that day was excruciating, but non-the-less, these young students and sweaty Americans put their hearts and souls in to cutting down a tree and constructing a cross much larger than themselves, in the front of the community.

A couple of days after the American group left, a few of the students wanted to take our Bible class out to the cross.  We sang songs and quoted scripture verses as we hiked down the path, through the jungle, to get to the commemorable location.

Our songs quickly vanished as we noticed that the cross was gone.  Puzzled looks came across everyone’s faces and then you could feel the wave of emotions from bewilderment to hurt to anger, flood the air.  Who would take down a cross?!?  Who would do such a thing?!?

The students didn’t take this lightly! This cross was personal to them.  After the initial shock wore off, a search-and-rescue mission immediately began.  After about 10 minutes, I heard *Michelle yell, “It’s here!  The cross is here!!  I found it!!!”  Excited little bare feet came running out of the jungle and stood at the top of the steep river bank.  All eyes stared down to see if the news was true.  *Oliver ran straight passed the onlookers and went right down the bank, arriving at *Michelle’s side.  He confirmed that it was, indeed, our cross.  Cheers went up from all of us.

As *Oliver and *Michelle began to lift the cross, both he and *Michelle quickly came to a halt. *Michelle hesitated and then looked up at me and with the biggest tears in her eyes, she said, Jennifer, it’s broken.  They broke our cross!  Our cross is broken!!  Do you think… Do you think we can fix it?  It can be fixed… right, Jennifer???”  Tears streamed down my face as I called down to her, “Yes *Michelle, yes.  Don’t worry.  We can fix it.  The cross can be fixed.”  

*Oliver, being the typical 12-year old boy that he is, had no idea what to do with this crying 13 year-old-girl in front of him.  He gave her a quick pat on the back, said a few words to her, and then motioned with his hands for the rest of the crew to come down and help them.  Together, they pushed, pulled, tugged, and maneuvered the heavy pieces of the cross back up the bank.

Together, we fixed the cross.  Smiles were back on everyone’s faces as we prayed around the cross and had a lesson on forgiving those who in one way or another break our “crosses” in life.  Nothing goes unnoticed by our Great God.  He sees it all.

Romans 12:19 says, “Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written, ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the Lord.” 

Has someone in your life broken your cross?  Have they hurt you or disappointed you in a way you hadn’t dreamed possible?  Have you turned away from God because someone broke your cross, years ago, by abusing you, stealing from you, or lying to you in an unforgettable way?

Today, let God fix your cross.  The cross can be fixed, I promise.  No matter how badly someone has shattered the pieces of your hopes, dreams, or your life in general, they can be fixed.

Jesus, God’s only Son, came to this earth to fix all of our broken crosses.  Before you or I were ever born, before we ever experienced a broken cross moment in our lives, God set in place a Savior who would bare all our crossed and help us put any and all broken pieces back together.

Here’s a pat on the back (and a Huge Hug) from *Oliver and I.  Pray now, and ask God to fix your broken cross.  Go and enjoy today, free of all the pressures that those broken cross pieces (grudges, hurts, and pains) have been on you for so long.  

*Names have been changed in order to honor security regulations.